Bartolomé de las Casas and the Conquest of the Americas

“Beside my students, I would recommend this book to anyone with a desire to understand better what is one of the most compelling periods in history.”  (The Journal of Latin American Studies, 1 April 2013)

"Clayton (Univ. of Alabama) has written an excellent, concise survey of the life and work of Bartolome de las Casas, the Dominican friar who advocated fiercely on behalf of indigenous Americans during the 16th-century Spanish conquest of the America. . .Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates and above." (Choice, 1 October 2011)

 

“Clayton has written a wonderful biography of Las Casas--churchman, thinker, author, reformer and crusader for justice.  A major figure in Spanish American history, Las Casas is presented as a complex man, controversial in the world he lived in, and influential in creating perception of Spain and her colonies that endured for centuries.”
Susan Socolow, Emory University

“This is a full biographical study of one of the major figures of the early modern period, a person who left his mark on his contemporaries and posterity as much as the great monarchs of Spain, England and France. . . It should be a new classic on the life and significance of one of the major figures in the struggle for human justice.”
Noble David Cook, Florida International University

“Lawrence Clayton has produced an excellent, insightful and highly nuanced biography that does full justice to the most extraordinary advocate of human rights in the history of the Americas, Bartolomé de las Casas. Exhaustively researched, sympathetically written and enhanced by illustrations, maps and an excellent bibliographic essay, this work constitutes an extraordinary contribution to the growing literature on the subject.”
Franklin Knight, Johns Hopkins University